As the Covid-19 pandemic keeps ripping through the world, the Delta variant (B.1.617.2) has spread to many countries like a wildfire – thanks to poor healthcare system, gross violation of health norms and vaccination fiasco.
The deadlier variant, caregorised by the World Health Organisation (WHO) on May 11 as a variant of concern, has prompted a number of countries to impose or extend Covid curbs.
The WHO earlier this month reported that the Delta variant had already been found in nearly 100 countries, fearing that it would soon become dominant globally.
The pandemic this year saw a serious turn when India experienced a massive wave of infections peaking at close to 400,000 daily cases in mid-May. The Delta variant rapidly emerged as the dominant strain in India, before engulfing countries including Bangladesh. It is now dominant in countries as diverse as the US, the UK, Russia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Australia and Fiji. And, the number is growing.
The trend shows that three major factors are worsening the crisis: faulty healthcare management, rampant breach of health rules and vaccination complications.
For instance, Bangladesh has been witnessing the worst spell of the pandemic, with daily cases and casualties growing at an alarming pace since April.
Infographic: What we know about Delta variant
This is happening amid growing uncertainty centering inoculation, with the nationwide vaccination resumed on July 8 after a hiatus caused by low supply of vaccine doses back in late April.
Added to the woes was the detection of the Delta variant in the country on May 8, with a latest study revealing that around 70% cases belong to the highly transmissible variant in Dhaka alone.
The situation in two Delta variant hotspots—Khulna and Rajshahi divisions—is no worse than a nightmare, with daily caseload and body count mounting with harrowing figures.
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This propelled the government to impose a strict lockdown as most commoners largely avoid the mandatory health rules including masking up and social distancing in Dhaka and elsewhere.
Amid the crisis came a government decision on a wholesale transfer of doctors, which was later revised though, picturing the lack of proper planning to battle out the pandemic. This happens when hospitals are packed with Covid patients.
Now a close look at the US, where Covid cases started to plummet since January as compared to the harrowing figures since the pandemic’s emergence, shows that the country is currently under the tight grip of the Delta variant—something a latest government finding attests to.
In the past week, around 93% cases occurred in counties with below 40% vaccination, with preliminary data from recent months suggesting 99.5% deaths occurred in unvaccinated people.
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The caseload is surging in counties representing nine million people, said US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky.
Mistrust or lack of interest about vaccination is a major reason for the situation, especially in the US Midwest.
A Fortune article reads that President Joe Biden set a goal for 70% of American adults to get at least one Covid-19 shot by July 4, but in vain despite ample vaccine supplies, largely because the government has struggled to give away shots in rural, deeply conservative regions that are bastions of support for his predecessor, Donald Trump.
Unvaccinated America is made up of places like Springfield: rural and small-urban areas where residents harbor doubts about the vaccines and pandemic skepticism runs deep.